A Premise Salesman with Some Things on His Mind

Obama’s Vacation: Give it a rest.

President Barack Obama is back on the job. No more vacation…and so no more ignoring America’s problems and world chaos. And still the critics can’t let it go.

When the president goes on vacation it doesn’t mean he is sleeping until noon and spending the rest of the day getting drunk on pina coladas. It basically means he isn’t participating in a lot of the ceremonial duties of his office. The president is more or less synonymous with the office he holds. Where President Obama goes the White House goes with him. In part, at least, that is literally true, but most certainly in any practical sense it is the case.

America is a country neurotic about work. We shun vacations like no other advanced nation in the world. (Some of it increasingly by desperate necessity.) And we always seem to worry that some other guy isn’t working hard enough, especially the president these days.

The truth is we all need a little time a way. We all need vacations. Many of us — though not all — enjoy the benefit of a vacation of some form or another. Of all the people in the world who have earned and deserve a real vacation, the president’s vacation is probably less of a vacation than most.